Jim's column 19.12.2020

 The 0-0 draw with Huddersfield on Wednesday night, acknowledged by Mark Robins as one of the best results of the season, extended the Sky Blues unbeaten run in the league to eight games. I had to go back a long way to find the last such run in the Championship and discovered it was Autumn 2003. In mid-October, under the stewardship of Gary McAllister, the team lost 3-1 at home to Cardiff before going on an eight-game run with one win and seven draws!

The only change that McAllister made after the Cardiff game was to drop goalkeeper Scott Shearer and give a debut to former Leicester and Liverpool custodian Pegguy Arphexad. Three days later City got a hard won 1-1 draw at Watford before winning 3-1 at Derby with Stephen Warnock and Patrick Suffo (2) on target. Then came five successive draws the final one being 1-1 at Crystal Palace when debutant loanee Johnny Jackson came off the bench to score a late equaliser. By this time Arphexad had been injured after just five games and Gavin Ward was between the posts. The run came to an end on a cold night at Rotherham when early goals from Darren Byfield and Shaun Barker gave the Millers the points. As a side note a certain Mark Robins came off the bench for Rotherham near the end. This turned out to be McAllister's penultimate game in charge – a week later he temporarily stood down to take care of his sick wife and Eric Black took the role. At the start of the run the Sky Blues were in 16th place, by the end of the run they were 15th. The eight game run was as follows:

October 21 Watford (a) 1-1 Staunton

October 25 Derby (a) 3-1 Warnock, Suffo 2

November 1 West Ham (h) 1-1 Barrett

November 5 Bradford C (h) 0-0 -

November 8 Sunderland (a) 0-0 -

November 22 Gillingham (h) 2-2 Joachim 2

November 25 Norwich (a) 1-1 McAllister (pen)

November 29 Crystal Palace (a) 1-1 Jackson

Over the last two weeks numerous people have asked me if Coventry City are close to setting a club record of penalties conceded in a season. At Wycombe last Saturday the Sky Blues conceded their seventh league penalty of the season and there have been two others in League Cup games at MK Dons and Gillingham.

The league penalties, which have all been converted, with the culprits, are:

QPR (h) Lyndon Dykes (foul by McFadzean)

Blackburn (h) Adam Armstrong (foul by Rose)

Nottm. Forest (a) Lyle Taylor (foul by McFadzean)

Watford (a) Ismaila Sarr (handball by O'Hare)

Norwich (a) Mario Vrancic (foul by Wilson)

Rotherham (h) Daniel Barlaser (foul by Wilson)

Wycombe (a) Joe Jacobsen (foul by Sheaf)

The penalty at MK Dons was saved by Marosi after Drysdale committed a foul whilst Jordan Graham scored from the spot for Gillingham after a foul by Rose.

The penalties had no effect on the final score in three of the league games but without them City would have picked up an extra point at both Forest and Watford and an extra two points at Norwich. It could be argued that at least five of the seven league penalties were soft and perhaps wouldn't have been given on another day.

The club record for league penalties conceded in a single season is 12, set in 2013-14 (the Northampton season). Goalkeeper Joe Murphy set a club record by saving five of them, so seven were scored.

The record for league penalties scored against City is 10, in 1979-80 season when no opposition penalties were missed/saved. That season some great players of the era netted from the penalty spot including Glen Hoddle (two in a 4-3 loss at Tottenham), John Robertson (scored home and away), Peter Barnes, Sammy McIlroy and John Wark.

In the last ten seasons the Sky Blues have conceded an average of seven league penalties a season whilst the average for the previous 64 seasons (i.e. since World War II) is 4.5 per season. This backs up the theory that there are more penalties given in the modern game. I haven't got the stats for penalties given in the domestic game this season but from watching Premier League games there seems to have been an increase, a number coming controversially as a result of VAR.

City have only been awarded one penalty this season (v Bournemouth) and their average for the last ten years in 3.9, just over half that conceded. Lets hope that the number of penalties conceded is one record that the Sky Blues can avoid this season and they can put an end to the current sequence.

This is my last column of 2020 so I will wish you and your families a Merry Christmas and a Happy 2021 when hopefully we will get back to watching the Sky Blues continue their phoenix-like rise up the leagues.

Jim's column 5-12-2020

 Former Coventry City player Graham Walker asked me for help in tracking down his senior debut for the club. Graham, a centre-half, joined the club's groundstaff straight from school and progressed to the professional staff. He had been in the reserve team for some time before he got his chance in October 1958. In the early years of floodlit football English clubs weren't allowed to play competitive games under lights and whetted fans' appetites for the new innovation by arranging friendlies with higher status teams, foreign teams and Scottish clubs. Between 1953, when the first floodlights were installed, and 1959 City played 26 such friendlies. Almost 17,000 watched City play Queen of the South in the first floodlight game in October 1953 but the novelty slowly wore off and although a similar crowd watched the infamous game with Argentinian club San Lorenzo in 1956, crowds generally slipped under 10,000.

In October 1958 City invited Sunderland to Highfield Road for a floodlit friendly on a Monday evening. The Roker club, known as the Bank of England club just a few years previously because of the number of big money signings they had in their team, had lost their First Division status for the very first time the previous season. They had also been found guilty of illegal payments to players and suffered a heavy fine. In Division Two they were struggling having lost key players such as Don Revie and Billy Bingham and were bottom of the table with just three wins in 14 games. A 4-1 defeat at Bristol City on the previous Saturday had increased the gloom and their party had spent a miserable weekend at Leamington's Regent Hotel licking their wounds.

City, on the other hand were riding high in second place in Division Four after a 2-2 draw at Workington and looked a good bet for promotion from the division at the first attempt. Gates which had dropped to below 8,000 the previous campaign were above 20,000 with the team unbeaten in six games. They would be without their outstanding young centre-half George Curtis who had suffered concussion at Workington and had seen a specialist on the Monday morning. Graham tells the story: On the Monday morning I received a hand delivered postcard requesting me to report to Highfield Road for the evening game in which the “gaffer” Billy Frith was thinking of  playing me in the second half. We often received postcards either sent or hand delivered informing us when to report for certain games'.

                                          Graham Walker in his playing days

Frank Austin, normally a wing-half, deputised for Curtis but at half-time Graham was told to strip off and come on as substitute (in those days subs weren't permitted in competitive games). Austin moved to left half, replacing Mick Kearns and both he and Walker wore a number 5 shirt. It was 0-0 at half-time but Sunderland, even with several reserves, came to life after the break and England B international Stan Anderson put them ahead after 63 minutes. Nine minutes later Sunderland and former England winger Colin Grainger went down under a challenge from Walker and a penalty was awarded.

'It was never a penalty', says Walker, 'and after the final whistle Grainger winked at me and said “never mind kid. Win some lose some”.' Anderson scored from the penalty spot and Maltby added a third goal before Brian Hill headed a late consolation goal for City. Graham remembers the fog descending and that the the old fashioned floodlighting 'wasn't the best in those conditions'. The attendance of 4,979 convinced the club that the days of floodlight friendlies was over and it was the last one for over three years when Jimmy Hill reinstated them. I was able to send Graham a copy of the match report and after reading it he said that it wasn't a surprise that he had forgotten the game.

City's team that night was: Graham Spratt: Roy Kirk, Lol Harvey: Brian Nicholas, Frank Austin (sub Graham Walker), Mick Kearns (sub Frank Austin): Peter Hill, Ray Straw, Jimmy Rogers, Brian Hill, Ken Satchwell.